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English and Communications Faculty and Staff

Todd Edwards

Todd Edwards began performing with professional musicians at age 12, and entered the U.S. Air Force band out of high school, the “young kid” in an ensemble composed largely of college graduates.

“I was lucky they were looking for trombone players,” he quips. He entered the Air Force at age 18 at the pay grade of E1.

Thus began a 25-year career in the Air Force band program, for which he did every job imaginable—singing, playing various instruments, directing bands, loading equipment, running lights. During wartime he toured combat zones, performing for U.S. troops on flatbed trucks in the desert. “It’s not a concert hall you’re playing in.” He smiles. “We went to where the troops were, to give them a break from the 12-hour on-and-off shifts and the 130-degree weather, and everything else that was going on.”

After Edwards retired as a senior master sergeant, he went back to school, completing bachelor’s in social-science education from Wright State University followed by a master’s degrees in history from the American Military University in 2010.

Shortly thereafter he joined Norwich University as assistant commandant and director of bands, and calls coming to Norwich the best choice he could have made for a second career. “I love my job. And the best part of it is working with the students, whether in music or just being an ear.”